Getting a stable Fuge

I'm having a little trouble with getting my refugium stable. I syphon water from my main tank with 3/4 inch pvc pipe and I have two valves controllinng the water flow. However, even with tweeking the flow into the fuge, I cant seem to get it to match up with the pump to make the fuge stable. Over a period of an hour it always seems like its loseing water or getting too much.

How do you get this to equel out? Even if I had two pumps, I don't think its going to be very stable. The pump pumping the water town will be greater than the pump pumping up. Is this something everyone has to deal with and hopefully get a valve system that can make it somewhat stable? Any ideas of how to get this fixed would be greatly appreciated.
Ty

 

That way will never work in the long run. Is there a way you can make the fuge overflow into your sump? Such as drilling and adding a bulkhead to the side of it? Do you have a picture you could post and we could really help you out..

By the way, Welcome to 3Reef!

 

yeah you need an overflow box on your tank or on the fuge if you put it above your tank

 

Thanks for the replies, guys. I tried uploading some pictures from my phone but its not working right at the moment. I will have to try again tomorrow or figure something out.

I don't have a sump, really. Just the refugium. The water is siphoned from my main tank into the fuge, then a smaller pump pumping the water back to the main tank. I don't have a protein skimmer yet, or anything fancy. Just a fuge with some live sand, algie. I will get some pictures up tomorrow and see what you guys think. THanks again.

 

Ok, I couldn't get it off my mind, so I got my other camera out.











As you can see, a lot of DIY. The tank is 30 gallons and the fuge is 10 gallons. Even with those two valves to control the flow of the siphon, the fuge is still not stable really. THe water level in the return part of the fuge goes up and down and I can't get it to level out very well. I hope these pics help with the questions I asked earlier. Thanks, again.

 

Billings, Montana, eh? Last time I was in Billings it was when we won state football in 2005. Go CMR!

 

One problem I see is that your return line is much smaller than your drain. It looks like you are using 1/2" I.D. vinyl tubing for return. 1/2" is very restrictive. My eye scould be wrong, but if it is, I would strongly suggest opening it up to 3/4" or 1" tubing for the return. As long as your overflow can handle a high drain rate, your return will determine the flow to your fuge. If your pump is 500GPH and overflow is rated up to 800GPH, you will never max out your overflow, your system will run at 500GPH. But if your pump is 800GPH and your overflow is 500GPH, you will have overflowing issues in your DT, you DT level will rise and fall as your overflow catches up with the water draining in the plumbing, assuming you have enough safety in your water level in your tanks. I hope that makes sense.

 

I have something very similar to u set up. I made a DIY PVC overflow(3/4") and have a return pump with 1/2" PVC.

http://www.3reef.com/forums/general-reef-topics/pvc-overflow-81130.html

I have a T at the exit of my return pump(~750gph), I put a valve at each outlet of the T, one goes to the DT and I am going to use the other for a reactor or skimmer.
I just played around with the valves until I got it to balance.

 

Thanks for the input. That does make sense that the 1/2 inch tubeing probably is too restrictive. The pump is pretty small though, only 280 max GPH with 4 feet height max. I was thinking the flow fromt he pump was so slow because the fuge is about 3-4 feet under the main tank. I will give bigger tupeing a try. I believe I can put 3/4 inch tubeing on the return pump, and I'm really headed in the direction of getting a bigger pump also.

It's going to take a pretty big pump to keep up with the siphon, though. When you turn that 3/4 inch siphon on full, it sucks some mad water down it. Probably too much for my 30 gallon tank, anyways.

 

We put the T on ours also, with one valse on the line that does not go back to the main tank. One tube from the T goes to the main tank and the other ones goes back into the fuge to try and get the water level to equel out. Thanks for the link.